Monday, 27 July 2009

Hill Street Rainbows

Lancashire Police hits targets on minority staffLancashire Police have exceeded targets for the number of ethnic minority and female staff they have recruited.

Roll call. East Lancashire police station. 6 AM

Desk Sergeant. ‘Alright. Listen up. Sergeant Jekyll won’t be on duty today -’ boos and cat calls from the Day Shift police officers - ‘Stomach problems;he drank something that agreed with me. I’m Sergeant Hyde and I’ll be standing in for him today so if you were going to say it to him, or do it to him' - jeers and ribaldry - ‘ Then tell it to me, or do it to me. I’ll be sure to pass anything you say on once he’s on our feet again.
After the briefing I’ll be taking a voluntary cash collection for those of you wishing to buy him a get-well-soon gift which I confidently expect will be 100% of you and that goes double for the Siamese Twins -...
What? Sorry, I mean that ' that goes double for the Conjoined Twins' in the Equestrian Unit.
Now here’s Inspector T with the Night Shift briefing.’

But figures also show that the force has difficulty in getting people from ethnic minorities to apply for jobs.

Pendle Hill. 08.35 AM.

Constables Stein and Oliver ignored the werewolf thrashing and howling in its cage in the locked and parked-up patrol van as they stumbled wearily up the hill .
Stein's shirt was already sweat-soaked and they were only one third of the way to the top. The hot sunny weather of an already bright summer's morning was ideal for this kind of pursuit as these were precisely the sort of conditions that would bring their target out into the open. Managing four seafood restaurants in Padstow hadn't prepared him at all for his new duties after he was swept up in Lancashire Constabulary's aggressive minorities recruitment drive, and Jamie's laddish smells-like-fish jokes were beginning to get on his nerves.
Winded, Stein rested on his haunches behind a dry stone wall.
There came a dry, tapping rattle from just up ahead as if from a pair of skeletal hands typing out Morse code on coconut shells, and then an electronic humming started up as if powerful alien energies were being uploaded into an advanced weapon system. Oliver took a look through the binoculars but it took some time for his eyes which had been befuddled by ultra-smart stealth technology to pinpoint the wavering, silvery silhouette of the unearthly man-hunter crouched amongst scrubby hedging by the lane.
'He's one ugly mother fucker just as Gordon Ramsey said,' chirped the cockney super chef cheerfully. 'I don't know why the Chief Constable thinks so much of us though; nor why he wants celebrity chefs on his force anyway.'
Stein though for a while. 'I think it's scarcity value lad. Also who knows what it would be like if they ever gathered us together in the same place with Anthony and Delia and Ainsley and Nigella ? It'd guess something akin to 30 Days of Night with sun dried tomatoes and basil.'
'Unchecked, I suppose we are a bit of a headache to those in authority. Britain can only support half a dozen or so super-chefs without ruining what's left of the economy,' agreed Oliver, checking the magazine of his Heckler and Koch. 'Maybe he wants to thin our numbers a bit too and chasing this creature's his way of doing it.'
'That's just what I thought. The fewer we are, the higher the prestige for having us on his force.'
'You should have told him so at the passing-out parade then,' replied Oliver, lashing a grenade to his spear and smearing himself with Pendle's thick, heat-insulating mud.'I did,' Stein muttered, notching a fire arrow onto his bowstring, 'I told him we aren't aspirins and we don't do this kind of work.'
As they crawled through gorse bushes and worked their way around the contour of the hill towards the skull-polishing invader, Stein ponded the likelihood of success even if they survived and captured it alive. Both predator and werewolf were intelligent enough in their own ways so training shouldn't be a problem , but persuading them to hand out parking tickets without killing anyone was going to be a real bitch.

A police authority report says the county constabulary aimed to recruit six per cent of staff from black and ethnic minority ethnic groups, but in fact recruited 6.5 per cent.And the target of recruiting 40 per cent female staff was exceeded as 40.5 per cent joined over the same period.

TowneleyPark, Burnley.11.37 AM.

The Inspector stared down at his favourite detective ruefully. He turned to the Chief Superintendent.
'She's got the biscuit Jack. I know she's got the biscuit. I saw her carrying the biscuit just a few minutes ago, and if we can get it to the Scenes Of Crime Officer quickly we'll have all the evidence we need to bring Mister butter-wouldn't-melt-in-his-mouth Fudd to court.'
'Jailing the Burnley Shredded Wheat Slasher will be a feather in your cap indeed Shrek,' agreed CS Sparrow; his head twitching sharply to the side with a barely-sane flash of oiled dreadlocks and brightly-painted Caribbean nut beads. 'The Chief Constable's never presided over a force that's brought an honest-to-God cereal killer to justice before.'
'Please don't blaspheme the Creator's name,' insisted the leggy, wide-jawed and very beautiful blonde woman standing with them.'Apologies, Detective Sergeant. I forgot that your people are deeply religious.'
'Perhaps if I gave her a tummy-rub, I could persuade her to show us where she buried it?' mused Shrek aloud. 'What do you think, Lassie? Nice tummy rub and when you've shown us the biscuit we can take you over to meet Gromit if you like?' He moved to stroke the sniffer dog who was newly-promoted to plain-coat detective.'And don't treat females as pets and playthings either,' added Caprica Six crossly in her Canadian-Cylon accent.

But although 20.8 per cent of application packs were sent out to black and ethnic minority individuals, only 12.2 per cent of the packs were returned.
County councillor Tony Jones said in the report: “The difficulty is getting black and ethnic minority candidates to apply. “Once they do apply they tend to do rather well compared to other groups.

The abandoned Nostromo Chippy and Kebab-house, Darwen. 17.48 PM.

'Well they're black alright Ellen - but can they control angry football crowds?' asked her superior officer. The tall woman officer looked down at the squirming metallic things as they swarmed and wriggled and chittered in an armoured glass confinement pen inside a converted deep-fat fryer. 'Listen sir, Burnley FC's in the Premier League this season by a sheer fluke and everyone expects them to be beaten in nearly every game and humiliated in most of them and relegation back down to the Championship's all-but inevitable from day one. Riding herd on twenty thousand drunken and disappointed Dingles once a fortnight as they've staggered onto the streets after nineteen disastrous home to May is going to be no picnic.' She gazed into the pen as the rapidly-growing armoured creatures writhed like braided coils of polished coal and shot out needle-toothed inner mandibles from inside long, curved, eyeless heads.''We'll need force and lots of it for Operation Turf Out and these are the special constables who can supply that, so please don't second-guess me sir and let me do my job. I've gone to no end of trouble and some personal sacrifice to make this work.'
The Assistant Chief Constable stared at her questioningly.'I meant I've actually spilt blood for this operation,' she explained, acidly. 'I'm sorry Ripley. I had no idea about that,' the ACC apologised.'That's alright sir. It's just something I had to get off my chest.'

“We have a disappointing level of black and ethnic minority police community support officers in the constabulary, with only three per cent, and the Minorities Recruitment Team is taking active steps to address the issue.”Meanwhile the number of sergeants remained constant at 13 and the number of inspectors rose from five to six.

'And in conclusion, though it's too early to show that this programme has improved the quality of actual policing in Lancashire, it is possible to demonstrate that Lancashire Constabulary already has the most diverse staffing of any major police service in England,' finished the Deputy Assistant Chief Constable.'We've got him! We've got him!' cried the Chief Constable as he burst into the room, leading a short, wavy-haired man in a trenchcoat past the conference table. 'Let me introduce you to Inspector McLeod, lately of New York.' The newcomer inclined his head at the very much younger men and women of the Senior Management Team.'McCloud, as in the the famous New Mexico detective who did so much to clear up crime despite the cynical, demoralized and weary police of New York City in the 1970s?' asked Head Six from inside the Deputy Assistant Chief Constable's fevered and libidinous imagination.
'Inspector McLeod is an internationally renowned antiques expert,' explained the Chief Constable to all present; real or imaginary, 'Who specialises in identifying ancient weapons: especially swords.' He went on: 'In terms of diversity, he will be absolutely the jewel in Lancashire's crown.'
'Helping with SOCOs with forensics in stabbing incidents, I suppose?' asked the ACC, rather doubtfully.'No, no! Think man: think! Minorities is the name of the game here - minorities! And what better or greater or more prestigious minority could this or any other county police service have than an individual who's unique?' He looked around at his deputies and assistants proudly. 'And I'm sure that you'll all agree that as uniqueness goes, being immortal by avoiding decapitation is pretty damned unique!'
'There can be only one,' affirmed Connor McLeod.